before sailing for the Continent, appearing sud

denly at Forster's house, seated upon his bed there, with Dickens in presence, mumbling about Latin poetry and its flavors!

He finds his way to Genoa, then to Florence, then to the Fiesole Villa once more; but it would seem as if there were no glad greetings on either side; and in a few days estrangement comes again, and he returns to Florence. Twice or thrice more those visits to Fiesole are repeated, in the vague hope, it would seem, floating in the old man's mind, that by some miracle of heaven, aspects would change there or perhaps in him- and black grow white, and gloom sail away under some new blessed gale from Araby. But it does never come; nor ever the muddied waters of that home upon the Florentine hills flow pure and bright again.

Final Exile and Death.

He goes back-eighty-five now-toothless, and trembling under weight of years and wranglings, to the Via Nunziatina, in Florence; he has no means now having despoiled himself for the

LAST DAYS OF LANDOR.

139

benefit of those living at his Villa of Fiesole, who will not live with him, or he with them; he is largely dependent upon a brother in England. He passes a summer, in these times, with the American sculptor Story. He receives occasional wandering friends; has a new pet of a dog to fondle.

There is always a trail of worshipping women and poetasters about him to the very last; but the bad odor of his Bath troubles has followed him; Normanby, the British Minister, will give him no recognition; but there is no bending, no flinching in this great, astute, imperious, headstrong, illbalanced creature. Indeed, he carries now under his shock of white hair, and in his tottering figure, a stock of that coarse virility which has distinguished him always — which for so many has its charm, and which it is hard to reconcile with the tender things of which he was capable; — for instance, that interview of Agamemnon and Iphiso cunningly, delicately, and so feelingly

genia

told

as if the story were all his own, and had no Greek root other than what found hold in the

greensward of English Warwickshire. And I

close our talk of Landor, by citing this: Iphigenia has heard her doom (you know the story); she must die by the hands of the priestor, the ships, on which her father's hopes and his fortunes rest, cannot sail. Yet, she pleads; - there may have been mistakes in interpreting the cruel oracle, there may be hope still,

"The Father placed his cheek upon her head

And tears dropt down it; but, the king of men
Replied not: Then the maiden spoke once more,—
'O, Father, says't thou nothing? Hear'st thou not
Me, whom thou ever hast, until this hour,

Listened to fondly; and awakened me

To hear my voice amid the voice of birds
When it was inarticulate as theirs,

And the down deadened it within the nest.'

He moved her gently from him, silent still:
And this, and this alone, brought tears from her
Although she saw fate nearer then, with sighs,—
'I thought to have laid down my hair before
Benignant Artemis, and not have dimmed
Her polisht altar with my virgin blood;

I thought to have selected the white flowers
To please the Nymphs, and to have asked of each
By name, and with no sorrowful regret,
Whether, since both my parents willed the change,
I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow,
And — (after those who mind us girls the most)

LAST OF LANDOR.

Adore our own Athena, that she would
Regard me mildly with her azure eyes;
But-Father! to see you no more, and see
Your love, O Father! go, ere I am gone.'
Gently he moved her off, and drew her back,
Bending his lofty head far over hers,

And the dark depths of nature heaved and burst:
He turned away: not far, but silent still:

She now first shuddered; for in him

so nigh,

So long a silence seemed the approach of death
And like it. Once again, she raised her voice,-
'O Father! if the ships are now detained

And all your vows move not the Gods above
When the knife strikes me, there will be one prayer
The less to them; and, purer can there be
Any, or more fervent, than the daughter's prayer
For her dear father's safety and success?'

A groan that shook him, shook not his Resolve.
An aged man now entered, and without
One word, stept slowly on, and took the wrist
Of the pale maiden. She looked up and saw
The fillet of the priest, and calm cold eyes:
Then turned she, where her parent stood and cried,—
'O, Father! grieve no more! the ships can sail!''

141

When we think of Landor, let us forget his wrangles-forget his wild impetuosities - forget his coarsenesses, and his sad, lonely death; and

instead keep in mind, if we can, that sweet

picture I have given you.

Prose of Leigh Hunt.

It was some two years before George IV. came to the Regency, and at nearly the same date with the establishment of Murray's Quarterly, that Mr. Leigh Hunt,* in company with his brother John Hunt, set up a paper called the Examiner-associated in later days with the strong names of Fonblanque and Forster. This paper was of a stiffly Whiggish and radical sort, and very out-spoken-so that when George IV., as Regent, seemed to turn his back on old Whig friends, and show favors to the Tories (as he did), Mr. Leigh Hunt wrote such sneering and abusive articles about the Regent that he was prosecuted, fined, and clapped into prison, where he stayed two years. They were lucky two years for him- making reputation for his paper and for himself; his friends and family dressed up his prison room with flowers (he loved overmuch

* Leigh Hunt, b. 1784; d. 1859. Francesca da Rimini, 1816; Recollections of Byron, 1828; The Indicator, 1819-21; Autobiography, 1850.